Academic library directors in the eyes of hiring administrators: A comparison of the attributes, qualifications, and competencies desired by chief academic officers with those recommended by academic library directors

Librarians have traditionally looked to Academic Library Directors (ALDs) to list what qualities make them good at what they do. Little research has sought the input of institutional administrators (who are the ones who hire ALDs) about what they look for when hiring ALDs. This study presented a list of qualities that had been rated by ALDs as being important for the position to institutional administrators with the responsibility of hiring library directors. These hiring administrators were asked to rate the qualities and to add to the list any qualities they felt were important. The means of their ratings were then compared with those of the library directors to see how closely the ratings of the two groups matched. The results showed that there was statistically significant agreement between the two groups, but also that there were important differences. The principal differences were that the hiring administrators tended to place more priority on ideological attributes (attributes based on professional orientations and ideals) while academic library directors rated experience as more important. The hiring administrators also added several attributes to the original list, including managing multiple priorities, being learning/student oriented (especially toward low achievers), being self-directed with a good work ethic, being able to relate effectively to all constituencies, and experience in the same type of institution for which the administrator would be hiring the ALD.